🏏IPL 2025,M41 MI vs SRH on Apr23rd 7:30pm IST @ Hyderabad 🏏

🏏 IPL 2025 – Match 41: Sunrisers Hyderabad vs Mumbai Indians | April 23, 7:30 PM IST | Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium, Hyderabad 🏏

Sunrisers will be coming into the clash after losing their last match against the same opposition by four wickets. The previous edition's finalists haven't had an ideal season, losing five out of their seven games and are sitting at the ninth position on the points table. Hyderabad's only hope to make it to the top four is if they win all their remaining six games. Notably, another loss will most likely dent their chances further, keeping them only mathematically in the race.

On the other hand, MI have picked up the pace after enduring early defeats and are currently sixth on the table with four wins. Hardik Pandya has led his troops well and has given his side a good chance to secure a playoff berth. They are currently on a three-match winning streak and will hope to build on it further.

Preview

In the lead-up to the 2019 ODI World Cup in England and Wales, the fan scorecards were quietly redesigned to accommodate team totals up to 500. It was a reaction to England's dizzying new approach of fearless hitting on pancake-flat, tailor-made pitches that threatened to upend batting conventions. But as it turned out, the revision was an overcorrection. Across 48 matches in the tournament, no total crossed even 400. And only four went past 350.

Nearly six years later, we tuned into this IPL season with a similar sense of anticipation. The stars seemed aligned: the subtleties of the Impact Player rule had taken hold, a generation of Indian batters had been unshackled, and the science of pitch preparation had quietly evolved into an art form. Hype, too, had its moment. At a Sunrisers Hyderabad fan event before the tournament, Pat Cummins smiled, held up three fingers and said the magic number: t-h-r-e-e h-u-n-d-r-e-d.

Cummins might have been playing to the crowd that day, but the 300 dream didn't seem misplaced when SRH opened their season with 286 for 6, the second-highest total in IPL history. It was a batting performance that sent the hype train into overdrive. Dale Steyn, picking up on the early season mood, playfully predicted that 300 runs could be scored when SRH faced Mumbai Indians on April 17 at the Wankhede. And to be fair, it hardly felt far-fetched; the venue seemed built for it.

But when the day arrived, it was a different story altogether. Wankhede, almost impishly, dished out its slowest pitch on the square, a surface so sluggish it felt like a betrayal. SRH, seemingly happy to be sent in first, spent their innings looking less like the blazing force of opening night and more like travelers stranded on alien land.

The Wankhede match was, in many ways, a reflection of the season itself, which like the 2019 ODI World Cup promised a revolution in run-making but has so far unfolded in stops and starts, with power and intent from batters checked this time by reverse swing and searing yorkers.

Now comes the rematch. SRH host Mumbai in Hyderabad. A truer surface, perhaps even the notorious Pitch No. 2 at Uppal, could offer the stage that Wankhede denied. And three hundred in an innings? April 23 might be the night the magic number comes alive. But then again, given how this season has unfolded, who's to say.

When: Match 41, IPL 2025, on April 23, 07:30 PM LOCAL

Where: Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium, Hyderabad

What to expect: Everything SRH searched for at Wankhede and at other away venues, and never found. So a flat pitch, true bounce and a sea of orange in the stands. Three out of four games at this venue this season have been won by the chasing side. The weather is set to be hot but no rain is expected.

Head to head: MI 14 - 10 SRH

Team Watch

Sunrisers Hyderabad

Injury/availability: There are no reported injuries in the squad.

Tactics & Matchups: Rohit Sharma dazzled in MI's last game with an unbeaten 76 but before that game he had not batted past the PowerPlay. The Indian captain will be up against two bowlers from the Sunrisers who have a favourable record against him. Pat Cummins and Mohammed Shami have dismissed Rohit five and three times respectively in the IPL.

Probable XII: Abhishek Sharma, Travis Head, Ishan Kishan, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Heinrich Klaasen (wk), Aniket Verma, Abhinav Manohar, Pat Cummins (c), Harshal Patel, Zeeshan Ansari, Mohammed Shami, Eshan Malinga

Mumbai Indians

Injury/availability: Karn Sharma missed the last match against CSK because of stitches on his right thumb and he could be available again for this match.

Tactics & Matchups: It's no secret that SRH's wins lately have been built on their opening partnerships. In fact, the pair of Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma averages over 81 in victories but only 18 in defeats, so it's a partnership MI would want to break early but it might not be so straightforward. Trent Boult has just two PowerPlay wickets so far. The good news, though, is that he enjoys favourable match-ups against two of SRH's top-three. Abhishek strikes at around 100 against Boult (30 off 29 balls, 2 dismissals) whereas Ishan Kishan, who bats one-down, fares even worse (43 runs off 46 balls, 3 dismissals).

Probable XII: Rohit Sharma, Ryan Rickelton (wk), Will Jacks, Suryakumar Yadav, Tilak Varma, Hardik Pandya (c), Naman Dhir, Mitchell Santner, Deepak Chahar, Trent Boult, Jasprit Bumrah, Ashwani Kumar

In the spotlight: Nitish Kumar Reddy and Mitchell Santner

MI's turnaround win against DC was set up by Mitchell Santner dismissing Karun Nair with a jaffa that pitched around middle and off and clipped top of off. That was a shortish ball at 90ks. But he can also loop a ball at 77ks, draw a batter forward and have him stumped, like he did to Chennai Super Kings' (CSK) Shaik Rasheed. His ability to bowl defensively or aggressively on demand makes him a more conditions-agnostic fingerspinner than most others.

Nitish Kumar Reddy has had a sharp dip in form. He has scored 131 runs at an average of 21.33 and a strike rate of 113.91 in seven games. He hasn't bowled yet either. SRH probably need a batter who can bat long, but Reddy hasn't been successful in doing that so far.

Pitch and Conditions

The pitch at Hyderabad is likely to be a belter not just because that's generally the case but also because SRH's batters need to turn a corner. There have been four scores of 240-plus this season in eight innings so far, so expect a lot of runs. It's going to be a warm evening after a hot day, where the max temperature is forecast to be 38° celsius in Hyderabad.

Stats and Trivia

Hyderabad as a ground has the highest strike-rate amongst batters and also the place where most sixes have been hit this season.

MI's batters averaged 28.50 and scored at a run rate of 8.60 in their first four games, but those numbers have shot up to 36.04 and 10.25 respectively in the last four.

MI's run-rate of 10.51 in the middle overs since April 7 is the best among all teams.

Did you know

- Abhishek Sharma has seven centuries in T20 cricket, and he's scored six of those since January 2023.

- Since scoring a 47-ball hundred on his SRH debut, Ishan Kishan's form has tapered off and he's made just 32 runs in six innings.

- Sunrisers' spinners have picked up only 7 wickets across 7 games, the worst amongst all the other IPL teams. Punjab, who are the second-worst, have picked up 16 wickets in eight games with their spin-attack.

Quotes

"It's just a game but emotional playing at my home-ground. So I just want to do my basics right and do well for the team."

Tilak Varma on playing for an away team in Hyderabad

SRH AJ JEET JANA PLZ